Book Review of Federico Barocci: Allure and Devotion in Late Renaissance Painting / Stuart Lingo.--ISBN 978-0-300-12125-4. Reviewed by Andrea Walton

Andrea Walton

Humanities Commons

Copyright © 2009 ARLIS/NA   Federico Barocci: Allure and Devotion in Late Renaissance Painting / Stuart Lingo.—New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, January 2009.—294 p.: ill.–ISBN 978-0-300-12125-4 (cl., alk. paper): $75.00.                           This study offers a new interpretation of Federico Barocci’s work as an artistic protagonist following the Council of Trent. Barocci emerged during an age of religious and pictorial transitions now defined as the Counter-Reformation when artists were criticized for failing to produce either devout or artful images. The author investigates the negotiations between retrospection in the form of archaism and innovative pictorial practice through the use of color emanating from this religious crisis.  Such interplay characterized Barocci’s work as well as much of the best art of the second half of the sixteenth century. This book provides a close reading of his output, related documents, and art theory and gives new insights into critical High Renaissance artistic issues including the developing correlations between music and art.  The emotionally compelling character of Barocci’s work identified as vaghezza (beauty) is fundamental to the comprehension of his style which incorporates sensual and erotic connotations, seemingly contradictory in religious works. The first half of the study (chapters one through four) focuses on the attempt to define what constituted a ―devout‖ image and Barocci’s reflections on the history of art and image making as he formulated visual responses. The second half (chapters five through eight) investigates the artist’s engagement with the currents of his time rather than that of the past. A later chapter explores a unique form of vaghezza identified by Giovan Pietro Bellori (the seventeenth-century theorist and biographer) as central to Barocci’s paintings—namely music. This aspect of Barocci’s art has never been seriously studied until now. According to Bellori, the artist called painting ―music‖ and his cultivation of vaghezza in the field of color was closely related to musical tone and harmony. The author concludes by turning from an analysis of elements underpinning the artist’s visual thinking and perception of his era to a sight-reading (in the musical sense) of the Rest on the Return from Egypt in the Pinacoteca Vaticana.  The author is the assistant professor of Renaissance Art in the Division of Art History, School of Art at the University of Washington, Seattle. His research and teaching interests concern Italian art and culture from 1300-1600. This study includes notes, photo credits, an index, and a bibliography through the end of 2007. The academic style insures an audience of scholars, period specialists, and an informed general public. Approximately one third of the book is comprised of generous black and white or full color illustrations to the text and includes image details illuminating Barocci’s brilliant color and brushwork. The physical structure contains pages that are glossy and sewn in, increasing the volume’s durability. This work is an important addition to the field of High Renaissance studies. It does not replicate previously published materials and therefore it is recommended for purchase.   Andrea Walton, MLS, MA, krw1@nyu.edu 

Federico Barocci: Allure and Devotion in Late Renaissance Painting

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Federico Barocci: Allure and Devotion in Late Renaissance Painting

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